Arne Wilhelmsen, a founder of Royal Caribbean Cruises, dies at 90

Arne Wilhelmsen, a founder of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., died Saturday in Palma, Spain. He was 90.

Wilhelmsen, a native of Norway, began working for his family’s shipping business, Anders Wilhelmsen & Co AS, in 1954, after graduating from Harvard Business School. He became the company’s president in 1961.

In 1968, he helped establish Royal Caribbean Cruise Line and quickly targeted the warm weather cruising market in Miami. He served on the company’s board of directors for more than 30 years.

“At a time when the rest of the world thought cruising was a niche use for old transatlantic liners, Arne was already seeing glimmers of the growth that was possible,” said Richard Fain, RCL’s chairman and CEO. “He had a vision of the modern cruise industry when the ‘industry’ might have been a dozen used ships, total.”

In 2003, Wilhelmsen was succeeded on the company’s board of directors by his son, Arne Alexander Wilhelmsen, chairman of the family’s company, now known as Awilhelmsen.

Awilhelmsen Group remains the largest shareholder in Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.

Taylor Dolven

Miami Herald

305-376-2052

Taylor Dolven is a business journalist who has covered the tourism industry at the Miami Herald since 2018. Her reporting has uncovered environmental violations of cruise companies, the impact of vacation rentals on affordable housing supply, safety concerns among pilots at MIA’s largest cargo airline and the hotel industry’s efforts to delay a law meant to protect workers from sexual harassment.